Selection at Eleven in Northern Ireland

Now that the constitutional monstrosity the assembly is in place in N. Ireland and has bedded in, as some one who calls himself a Federal Unionist – Early Sinn Fein, it is my belief that the assembly will eventually shake itself apart due to inherent constitutional contradictions. In the meantime it may be useful to look at an aspect of government in the six counties (N. Ireland) –namely selection at eleven.

I first came across academic selection in an official capacity when I was Belfast President of the Irish National Teacher’s Organization during the Harold Wilson administration and dealing with academic selection at the time was part of my remit as union president. It was my firm belief then as it is now that selection is a sine qua non of education. What remains to be decided is at what age selection should take place and who should do the selecting.

The age of selection at eleven is quite arbitrary. That age was set up following the 1948 Education Act, which looked forward to universal secondary education. At that time compulsory education ended at 14. In the secondary schools that were to come into being, the government decreed that secondary schooling should be at least 3 years so the age set for selection was eleven. So selection at eleven is quite arbitrary, but even so for right wing Union Jack Unionism selection at eleven is sacred and is carved in stone.

The I.N.T.O. at that time campaigned for the abolition of the eleven-plus and for the introduction of comprehensives in the six counties (N. Ireland) but this was defeated by a powerful grammar school lobby. My personal position was that selection at eleven be abolished and that pupils be given the opportunity of selecting themselves and should not be divided into sheep and goats by the state. With that in mind and in the knowledge that selection is a sine qua non of education I backed a system of all ability Primary schooling with transfer to an all ability middle school at the age of eleven with compulsory schooling ending at 16. In this system, selection which I stress is an essential part of education, should take place at 14 the pupils being supported at 14 by careers advice along with an academic profile of each individual pupil, beginning in the primary sector and continuing into the second year of middle schooling. At 14 the school should be streamed into academic and vocational groups. For the first two years of middle schooling the classes should be of mixed ability with class setting being allowed to cater for slow and fast learners, as is the practice in primary schooling. The aim of the middle school should be to turn out a school population that is literate and numerate At 16+ those with an academic bent should move to sixth form colleges. This system of education is similar to the system of education in Craigavon in N.Ireland as of now.

The school curriculum should allow two forms of knowledge---Know that – and Know how. This would in keeping with the revised curriculum at present being muted for schools, the emphasis being on Know How. The distinction between Know That and Know How may be made in this way. For example, I know that a car has four wheels, a steering wheel, seats back and front, that cars are of different colours and that they should be taxed and insured. All of that is--- know that--- about a car and is in a way useless knowledge. What is meaningful is knowing how to drive a car or knowing how to fix a car when it breaks down and that is useful knowledge. Know How has to do with the learning of procedures. A competent driver knows how to proceed along a highway and a competent mechanic knows how to proceed in repairing a car. A 21st century economy requires Know how from its population and know how requires instruction. Traditionally-- Know That-- has been taught in schools but that form of knowledge is only of use in quiz shows. What should be of significance in modern education is learning how to proceed in the academic disciplines or in vocational skills.

It is evident that Right Wing Union Jack Unionism is hell bent on retaining selection at eleven. Be that as it may it is difficult to understand how the right wing in the six counties can reconcile selection by the state with right wing philosophy. It was Margaret Thatcher’s purpose in being Prime Minister to roll back the state. The Right Wing in the six counties should roll back the state out of the lives of children by allowing them to select themselves. The state should be kept out of it. The right wing is inconsistent in this but then they are consistent in being sectarian.

In all of this one must look at education in the inner city and education in the suburbs. When looking at inner city education I have in mind Late Sinn Fein (as distinct from my Federal Unionism – Early Sinn Fein) Late Sinn Fein having adopted a sectarian stance in relation to the protestant Shankill. I have heard Late Sinn Fein on the T.V. claim that the abolition of the eleven plus and the introduction of comprehensives is the cure all for low academic standards on the Shankill. More recently I heard Ms Ruane repeat this after a N.A.S/U.W.T. conference in Belfast but in singling out the Shankill in a problem that is an Inner City problem, Ms Ruane is being sectarian.

At the time I was President of the I.N.T.O. in Belfast I was also doing research into numeracy in the inner city in Belfast at the Faculty of Education at Q.U.B. The neighbourhoods selected for research were (1) The Shankill ( a protestant inner city enclave) (2) The Lower Falls (a catholic inner city enclave) (3) The Donegall Pass ( a protestant inner city enclave) (4) The Markets.(a catholic inner city enclave) The research looked at Basic Numeracy and Overall Numeracy at the end of Primary schooling.

Basic Numeracy This took as its criteria the ability to do simple addition subtraction, multiplication and division. The research revealed that over one third of the school population couldn’t do these basic operations at the end of primary schooling and were thus innumerate. When the statistics were tested rigorously for significance the performance of pupils in Controlled Schools (protestant) did not differ significantly from the performance of pupils in Maintained Schools (catholic) so the levels of innumeracy among pupils on the Shankill do not differ from the Levels of innumeracy among pupils on the Lower Falls. So why does Late Sinn Fein single out the Shankill when it comes to an Inner City problem in education. Does Ms Ruane and Late Sinn Fein think that innumeracy has something to so with religion and politics?

Overall Numeracy This level of numeracy was established in a wide-ranging test of mathematical knowledge at the end of Primary Education. When tested for significance between Maintained and Controlled Schools it was found that pupils in Controlled Schools out-performed pupils in Maintained Schools. So why does Ms Ruane knock the Shankill by singling it out? But there are swings and roundabouts in all of this. It has also been established in research that pupils in Maintained Schools out-perform pupils in Controlled Schools in verbal ability.

To take a still wider view of education one must look at inner city schools in relation to schools in the leafy suburbs. Had the research indicated been carried out in schools on the Malone it would be expected that pupils on the Malone would out-perform pupils in the Inner City. While this anomaly is true of Belfast it is also true of all cities in Ireland, in Great Britain, in Europe and in America. It was originally thought at the time of Harold Wilson that comprehensives were the corrective to this anomaly but this did not prove to be the case in England and Wales. There is now talk of bog standard comprehensives in England but these tend to be situated in the Inner City. Comprehensives in the suburbs tend to do well academically. The current Labour Government have tried to rectify this by having the state invade the classroom in telling teachers what to teach and how to teach it. It is now thought that this is making matters worse. It could be that the cause of the anomaly is due to the relative values that inner city families and suburban families place on educational attainment.

This is the problem that Ms Ruane will have to tackle in the six counties and there is no simple answer to it. So what is the point of Ms Ruane and Late Sinn Fein in singling out the Shankill for special note? To do that is raw sectarianism.

The Catholic Church has also climbed on the bandwagon of selection. Fr Farren argues that selection is an infringement of the catholic school ethos. Such hypocrisy! When it comes to selection the Catholic Church is a major culprit by insisting that children be taught apart in separate catholic and non-catholic schools. It is high time that integrated schools took over, and the teaching of divisive sectarian denominational religion was replaced with the teaching of unifying Christianity in all schools.


Michael Gillespie Federal Unionist --- Early Sinn Fein